Gulf Capital fully exits O&G services firm, Ghanaian data center wins AIIM backing, SunFunder’s latest debt fund reaches final close, and more…

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Last week in brief... Africa's solar energy sector provided us with a couple of notable times last week. The first was a fund close. SunFunder has held the final close for its third debt fund, reaching $70 million with a commitment from OeEB, the Austrian development bank. The Solar Energy Transformation Fund (or SET Fund for short) will invest in distributed solar energy and storage businesses in both Africa and Asia. The 9-year blended finance fund's typical investment will be structured as senior debt and range from as little as $500,000 up to as much as $9 million in size. If the upper limit is too little for a potential investee, the firm has the track record and networks to syndicate larger deals if required.

One of the continent's more prominent off-grid firms, Bboxx, has scored a new round of equity capital from two investors for its Kenya business. Both of the Investors - EDF and African Infrastructure Investment Managers (AIIM) - have previously partnered with Bboxx before. In the case of EDF, ( which now holds a 23% stake in the Kenya unit following the deal), Bboxx partnered with the French energy firm in a 50/50 JV in Togo in 2018. AIIM previously backed the solar energy firm in early 2019 with $31 million and with this latest deal is increasing its minority stake in the firm.

Staying south of the Sahara, AIIM featured again in another deal last week. The infrastructure investor is leading an investment on behalf of the firm’s third infrastructure fund and taking a majority stake in a carrier-neutral data center located in Accra. The transaction is being undertaken in partnership with the management team of Onix Data Centres, a new platform business. How much is being invested is not being disclosed, but Africa Capital Digest has learned that the fund, African Infrastructure Investment Fund 3, now owns 91% of the asset. Onix's plan is to achieve enough local and overseas clients to make sure the Ghana facility is running at full capacity and look for other datacenter acquisition or investment opportunities in other countries on the continent.

North of the Sahara, Gulf Capital has sold its entire interest in the Egyptian Chinese Drilling Company (or ECDC) in a secondary sale to another alternative investment firm based in the GCC region. The sale brings to an end a 7-year association between Gulf and Cairo-headquartered ECDC which began in 2014 when the alternative investment firm's first private credit fund backed ECDC’s founders for the first time. The fund made a follow-on investment in the oil and gas drilling and production services firm in 2017. Again, the terms of the deal remain confidential, but the full exit has reportedly earned Gulf Capital Credit Opportunities Fund I private equity-level returns.

In Morocco, real estate listings platform Mubawab has landed another $10 million from one of its major backers, Emerging Markets Property Group. This is the second investment from EMPG in as many years - in January 2020, the firm backed Mubawab with $7 million. The capital will be used to recruit nearly 200 more employees, add an investment advisory offering with a market study capability as well as a real estate advisory and consulting function to its portfolio of services. The firm will also Mubawab Transaction, a marketing service for new real estate projects.

INMA Holding, an investment set up by Mediterranean Corporate Finance, has acquired a stake in Les écoles Idéales, an education group operating a network of private schools teaching children from primary through high school in Tunisia. The new funding from INMA’s investment will be used to support Les écoles Idéales’s expansion plans, boosting its capacity with the opening of a new high school for 600 pupils in Nabeul as well as some new primary schools in the country's Cap Bon. The firm also plans to develop and launch a new e-learning offering in Tunisia. Neither the amount invested nor the size of the stake acquired by INMA is being disclosed.

In fund news, SouthBridge Group is teaming up with New African Capital Partners to establish a new permanent capital fund focused on financial services deal opportunities in Africa. SBNA, as the new vehicle is named, will invest long-term capital in companies operating in a range of financial subsectors, focusing on opportunities in financial services digitalization, financial inclusion, and sustainable finance, all areas where efficiency and technology will combine to open up the banking system to millions more people across the continent. The new fund will be headed by Charles Kié, the Co-Founder and CEO of New African Capital Partners. His counterpart at SouthBridge Investments is Frannie Léautier who heads up the investment banking group's investment arm last year.

TheInternational Finance Corporation is backing a ride-hailing company's Africa ambitions with equity. The DFI is investing $24 million in Estonia-basedBolt, a rival of Uber's on the continent, which has earmarked the capital for the firm’s plans to expand access to its services in underserved areas of cities in Africa and Eastern Europe – particularly South Africa, Nigeria, and Ukraine. While no valuation details were publicly disclosed, some analysts have reportedly estimated the company to be worth as much as $3.5 billion in the past.

And finally this week, a pan-African venture fund sponsored by early-stage tech investor HAVAíC and UK-based family office and investment manager Universum Wealth has held its second close. The HAVAíC Universum Core African Fund, as it is called, now has approximately half of its final goal target of $20 million to invest in startups solving “real-world problems” in sectors such as health, financial services, and business productivity. Typically the fund will take minority positions ranging from 10% up to 25% in each of its investments, allowing founders to retain control, but take board seats to be able to support the value creation aspects of the investment.

That's it for this week. As always, you can review these and other stories by clicking through to this week's preview edition of the newsletter.

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